We’re less than a week-and-a-half removed from the theatrical release of Tim Burton‘s Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, but the film is already a major box office hit. The blockbuster sequel had the third best debut of the year when it first arrived on the big screen at the start September, and the movie sat in the #1 spot in the Top 10 yet again this past weekend. It will go down as one of the most substantial big screen hits of 2024… which is why it’s pretty crazy to think that the studio demanded nearly $50 million to be cut from its budget in order to secure a theatrical release.
The New York Times has published an article about the quick box office success of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, and it includes a revelation that the movie didn’t have the easiest path through pre-production – primarily due to conflicts regarding costs and distribution. Per the article, there was an expected budget of roughly $147 million estimated, but Warner Bros. said that number had to come down to $100 million if it wanted to get theatrical distribution.
Tim Burton has some experience with streaming under his belt, as he is an executive producer on the hit Netflix series Wednesday, but in the discussion of making Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the idea of making it as a Max original was apparently a non-starter. In the words of producer Pamela Abdy,
That was never going to work for Tim. You’re talking about a visionary artist whose films demand to be seen on a big screen.
So how did Tim Burton and his fellow producers go about reducing the sizable budget for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice? Rather than compromising the creative vision for the movie, Burton’s agent, Mike Simpson, went about trying to renegotiate actor contracts. Instead of getting paid up front, the stars would instead have deals that would see them earn a percentage of the film’s post-release income. It took months for agreements to be made, but the project survived.
Now, all involved look like geniuses. The Beetlejuice sequel took many, many years to finally move through all of the stages of development, but now the film has made over $260 million around the globe (and, again, it’s really only just started its theatrical run). It currently ranks as the ninth biggest domestic release of the year, having already earned more than big titles like Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes and Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire.
Will all of this success eventually lead to the making of a Beetlejuice 3 a.k.a. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Beetlejuice? There hasn’t been any official word, but it’s hard to imagine that folks at Warner Bros. would be thrilled at the prospect, and one can imagine that the company would be just fine with a $147 million budget.